*2ndG dances are specific – usually pegged to a specific song with a specific arrangement. The choreography often matches a particular recording and will only work with that recording. Everyone in the line does the same step at the same time. The dance may be a combination of the best bits from several similar dances. It may be the creation of a choreographer who liked a recording and wanted to have “authentic” footwork attached to it. For more on 2nd G dances, click here.
Steve Kotansky observed Kurdish expats dancing in Berlin to this traditional Kurdish (Kurmanji) song. Although Kotansky observed Kurds dancing this footwork to this song, he doesn’t specify if the song was a live performance (likely) or the particular recording he used for teaching purposes (unlikely). Having seen many YouTubes of Kurds singing Xanimê, there is no standard way to perform the song, yet in the particular Kotansky/Moreau recording the arrangement matches changes in their recording exactly, including repeating the “chorus” but not the “verse”.
I could find no YouTubes of Kurds dancing to Xanime, though Steve Kotansky observed expats dancing to it in Berlin. The footwork in the first part is exactly the same as Delilo, the most common and popular dance among Kurds, though the “windshield wipers” are not. Kotansky may well have seen this footwork, and even the “windshield wipers”, but I suspect the dancers he saw were improvising previously recalled dance moves, not repeating a memorized formula.
The only YouTube I could find was of recreational folk dancers demonstrating the Kotansky rendition. Therefore I’m concluding this is a 2nd Generation dance, where the choreography matches the recording. The dance was also introduced by Yves and France Moreau.
“Xanime” (HAH nee meh) translates as “Lady”, and thus there are MANY songs with Xanime in the title, with different lyrics and melodies. The full title of the song Kotansky used is “Xanimê Lê Xanimê”. Lyrics can be found here.
Folkdance Footnotes 